Chapter 16: On Purpose

Nana dealt five hands of gin rummy at Tiernan's kitchen table before anyone said a true thing.

Cordelia lost the first four on purpose.

I could tell, because I was holding the same cards.

"Tell me," I said.

"Tell you what?"

"Why a $310 ring. Why a ticket. Why you screamed at three hundred people with a champagne tower behind you."

Cordelia laid her cards face down.

"I did the math in advance," she said. "I told you that already."

"What math?"

"I've picked first for twenty years, Gwen. On purpose."

Nobody moved.

Tiernan stood at the counter with his arms folded and did not look at me.

"The bangs?" I asked.

"I picked bangs because you'd always wanted them and never asked."

"The clarinet?"

"I picked it because you were funny when you played it badly."

"The college?"

"I picked it because the horse barn was across the road, and you'd never have gone first."

My chair scraped back.

"You steered me."

"I put things in front of you, and you picked them up. That's all I could think of. You wouldn't pick up anything on your own."

"You made my whole life a track."

"I made a track for you to be happy on," said Cordelia. "I just had to walk down it first."

I was shaking.

"Tiernan," I said.

"I was engaged to her on paper for two years," he said quietly. "She asked me the week after a horse sale."

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